ThinkFun's Education BlogHere to help parents make learning fun!

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Dimitra Neonakis always had a love for science and nature, but came late in life to formal science education. With degrees in visual and performing arts and an environmental monitoring certificate, Dimitra brings her A game to STEAM education. Dimitra has designed and classroom-tested science activities for formal and informal k-12 and collegiate science education since 2005. She works both with at risk and neurodiverse populations as well as typical students. Students fondly refer to her as Ms. Dee and Ms. Frizzle and they all agree that science is fun!

Rush Hour is ThinkFun’s most successful game to date, delighting families for over 20 years! Adults that grew up with the game proudly gift Rush Hour to their children, nieces, nephews, and grandparents alike.

Winter is in full swing and many of us are experiencing frigid temperatures. If you're staying indoors to keep warm, these four Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) activities will keep your little ones entertained. In addition to keeping busy, they'll be learning too! How can marshmallows help you learn engineering and necklaces help you learn code? Read below to find out!

All games are systems: the rules (or constraints), components (game pieces), space (from a soccer field to a game board to a tablet screen), and goal (to win!) interconnect. A game’s interconnected system is driven by player actions; as players learn a game, they also learn its system. Scholar James Paul Gee wrote, “Games encourage players to think about relationships, not isolated events, facts, and skills. In a game like Rise of Nations, for instance, players need to think of how each action taken might impact their future actions and the actions of the other players playing against them as they each move their civilizations through the Ages.” Similar to the aforementioned civilization building game Rise of Nations, the city management series SimCity tasks players with balancing a complex urban system. Another systems thinking game is Plague, Inc., in which players release a pathogen into a map of the world. Playing it illustrates how actual infections spread around the globe.

Being on winter break doesn’t have to mean you have to stop training your brain! To give you a boost this holiday season, we’re providing a list with a variety of brain games for all ages. These games are fun, challenging, and bring loved ones together. They won’t fit into a stocking, but they will certainly look pretty sitting underneath a tree! Keep your mind sharp this holiday season with some of our favorite brain games!

Monday, December 4th is National Dice day! There’s no better way to celebrate one of the oldest forms of gaming than by breaking out a dice game to play with family or friends. Did you know that the earliest evidence of dice was found in Egyptian tombs from 2,000 B.C.? Here are some great recommendations for dice based games that can be added to your next game night!

At ThinkFun, we love games that allow players to exercise strategic planning, spatial reasoning, creative thinking, and problem solving while developing patience, persistence, and determination. We also love simple, speedy games that make for exciting head-to-head match ups! From tile snatching to gelato mixing, these five games make for some fun, friendly, fast-paced, competition.